WHAT IS LEADERSHIP?Leadership is an interactive conversation that pulls people toward becoming comfortable with the language of personal responsibility and commitment.

LEADERSHIP TIPS“The crux of leadership development that works is self-directed learning: intentionally developing or strengthening an aspect of who you are or who you want to be, or both.” Primal Leadership by Daniel Goleman, Richard Boyatzis & Annie McKee (Harvard Business School Press)

A book, "I Didn't See It Coming," by Amy Dorn Kopelan, Nancy C. Widmann and Elaine J. Eisenman provides some coaching tips. Here are some Q&As by Ms. Kopelan that can prepare you for the arrival of that pink slip.

If there is a merger or acquisition, that's a common sign. To expect that anything will be normal is wrong. If a new boss comes into your division, that's a big sign. A less obvious sign may be when a coach is brought in to help with some of your management issues.

You have to think about your marketability. What are you doing to be your own best press agent? Another thing is to be constantly networking--inside and outside your company, as well as inside your industry.

You probably don't like to admit you were fired and would like to reframe the reasons for your exit for your new workplace. The answer comes back to what happened when you left. You should insist on controlling how your departure is framed. You can demand that you are the one to address your staff and your colleagues before anyone else. You can say that you're leaving to explore other opportunities, for example, and there need not be more of an explanation. If you control the official explanation for your exit, then wherever else you go, it's not an issue.

The business community must recognize that finding CEOs who can generate business results is necessary but not sufficient. Those we elevate or hire to become CEOs must also possess the distinguishing qualities of great leaders: the ability to build trust, inspire dedicated and engaged followers, and make service to others their preeminent priority. In other words, the core values of CEOs should be examined just as closely as their drive, intellectual depth, financial acumen, or track record.

To accomplish that, why not start with three small but powerful changes:

1. Corporate board members and others who recruit CEOs must adopt disciplined approaches to investigate a candidate's character.

2. Those who aspire to the CEO title need to understand that the ego-fired, command-and-control, "winning-at-all-costs" approach is no longer viable. Instead, by measuring success through the success of all those they serve, they will achieve superlative, sustainable results not only for their constituents but also for themselves.

Nominees for becoming a director should be selected on the basis of experience, knowledge, skills, expertise, mature judgment, acumen, character, integrity, diversity, ability to make independent analytical inquires, understanding of the company's business environment and willingness to devote adequate time and effort to board responsibilities.

However, board nominating committees decisions are trumped by candidates who make an effort to insinuate (themselves) into the good graces or favor of key committee members.

Flattery will get you everywhere, including on the boards of publicly held companies. That's the major finding of a study of 760 outside directors published in the April-May 2007 issue of the Academy of Management Journal (AOM). The AOM, a group of management scholars, has about 18,000 members in 102 countries.

The authors of the study of board members at 300 large and midsize corporations, polled and interviewed from 2000 to 2003, were James Westphal, a professor at the University of Michigan Ross School of Business, and Ithai Stern, assistant professor of Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Management. Their questions focused on three activities: identifying with or flattering other board members; monitoring and controlling CEO behavior; and giving advice or information to management when asked.

"Ingratiation had the strongest effect," says Westphal, who adds that he was "surprised" it outranked advice and counsel as an influence. "We hypothesized that ingratiation would have some effect," he says, "but didn't think the magnitude would be as much as it was."

Bottom Line---To bag another board seat, do these things:

Confirm, Flatter and Do Favors: One good turn for a fellow director, combined with compliments, and few strategy disagreements, ups the odds of getting on a colleague's board by 70%

Give the CEO Advice, if Asked: Not as good as ingratiation, but it helps. Giving top managers pointers or information seven times a year rather than just twice means a 30% better shot at a second board appointment.

Note:If you are a female or minority, this approach may not work for you. Just 11 of 81 minority directors and 20 of 131 women got on a colleague's board...below-average numbers. And both groups are less likely to benefit from flattering.

Even outstanding leaders struggle through career stretchesduring which they feel off track. It can be hard to spot the specific problem when you’re in the middle of it. But successful leadersdevelop techniques for recognizing their vulnerabilities and making rapid adjustments.

Leaders should regularly ask themselves questions that target seven areas, according to Robert S. Kaplan, in a Harvard Business Review article:

The best way to improve the effectiveness, while reducing the cost, of health care in the U.S. is to allow people to take a more activist approach to their family's health. That means giving the consumer of health care services the power to decide what is the most appropriate testing, prescription and solution to their health issues.

1. Moving the money-to-be-spent (of employer-paid annual health insurance) to the employee in a "Health Spending Account" (HSA) is the first step in the process of increasing health service providers efficiency. The Medicare Prescription Drug Improvement and Modernization Act of 2003 created Health Spending Accounts. A HSA is simply a tax exempt trust that allows employees and/or employers to save money to be used to pay for medical expenses that are not covered by a health insurance plan. The HSA must be paired with a high deductible health insurance plan.

These accounts differ from Flexible Spending Accounts in one important variable; they may accumulate funds over an extended period of time, and roll over the balance in the accounts from one year to the next. The accounts may also be rolled over from one employer to another, making them portable, like a 401(k) retirement plan. As long as the money is used to pay for medical expenses or health insurance premiums, the funds are tax exempt. The biggest advantage of the HSA is large premium savings for the employer and an opportunity for employees to accumulate tax exempt assets.

2. The second step is to share medical knowledge with people, through online Internet access to personal health records....enabling them to make smarter choices about their health habits and medical care.

Today, Microsoft's software animates more than 90 percent of all personal computers, while Google is the default starting point for most health searches. And people are increasingly turning to their computers and the Web for health information and advice. A Harris poll, published in July 2007, found that 52 percent of adults sometimes or frequently go to the Web for health information, up from 29 percent in 2001. The capability of the Web promises to accelerate a shift in power to consumers in health care, just as Internet technology has done in other industries.

Now, about 20 percent of the nation's patient population have computerized records--rather than paper ones. But these records still tend to be controlled by doctors, hospitals or insurers. A patient moves to another state, for example, but the record usually stays.

Electronic formatted patient records would give much more control to individuals, a trend many health experts see as inevitable. "Patients will ultimately be the stewards of their own information," said John D. Halamka, a doctor and the chief information officer of the Harvard Medical School.

Already the Web is allowing people to take a more activist approach to health. According to the Harris survey, 58 percent of people who look online for health information discussed what they found with their doctors in the last year. It is common these days, Dr. Halamka said, for a patient to come in carrying a pile of Web page printouts. "The doctor is becoming a knowledge navigator," he said. "In the future, health care will be a much more collaborative process between patients and doctors."

A Thorny Challenge

Personal health records promise to be a thorny challenge for practical and privacy reasons. To be most useful, a consumer-controlled record would include medical and treatment records from doctors, hospitals, insurers and laboratories. Under federal law, people can request and receive their personal health data within 90 days. But the process is complicated, and the replies typically come on paper, as photocopies or faxes.

The efficient way would be for that data to be sent over the Internet into a person's digital health record. But that would require partnerships and trust between health care providers and insurers and the digital record-keepers.

The Harvard Business Review (Sept. 2007) reported that the scarcity of women at the top reflects "the sum of discrimination that has operated at all ranks," and not any particular obstacle to advancement as women approach the executive suite.

Most efforts aimed at increasing the presence of women in the upper echelons of U.S. business focus solely on bridging the final step between the middle tiers and the top ranks. But Alice H. Eagly, a professor of psychology at Northwestern University and Linda L. Carli, an associate professor of psychology at Wellesley College argue that smaller, more subtle reforms are needed to address the more fundamental problem.

A multipronged approach will be the only way to lift women to the top of more companies.

Women executives need to ask themselves if the timing is right to consider?:

They miss opportunities to become more effective in their positions of influence and are often denied promotions they deserve. Hiring an executive coach can help them enormously. It's the right tool to alleviate common leadership problems.

The role of teams is growing, spurred by globalization and the enabling factor of communications technology.

Given the importance of work teams, it is more than a bit remarkable how much our society's perspective is focused on the individual. We school our children as individuals. We hire, train and reward employees as individuals. Yet, we have great faith that individuals thrown into a team, with little thought given to composition, training or leadership, will be effective and successful. Science strongly suggests otherwise.

1. An effective work group should be designed well from the start, bringing together people who can contribute to the right mix of knowledge, skills, tools and other resources necessary to succeed.

2. Face-to-face meetings, social interaction among members and a leader who establishes a good relationship with every worker help a team make the best use of its expertise and create a cohesive mission.

3. Generic teamwork skills such as setting goals, adapting to change, resolving conflict and providing feedback allow teams to learn from each challenge and continually improve their performance.

Source: The Science of Team Success, Scientific American Mind, June/July 2007